by Spriha Srivastava, Conversation Credit: Siddharth Rampal
I was waiting for a friend to join me and while waiting, I dived into the most popular pastime – Doom scrolling. After a few minutes, there he was. ‘So, how are you feeling right now?’ he asked while grabbing a seat. I was of course feeling happy to see him, but that question was strange. ‘What do you mean?’ I responded. He repeated, ‘how are you feeling right now?’ He read my expression and offered to explain. He saw me scrolling through my phone and the swipes made him guess that I was browsing through Instagram. He said, “We go through multiple posts, multiple messages, multiple kinds of music, reels and videos throughout the day. This scroll culture is slowly depriving us of having deep feelings.” I was intrigued and so I asked more. “Take this for instance. We open our Whatsapp window and usually have more than a couple of messages sitting for us. Let’s say, one text is a rib-tickling meme. We immediately begin to hit on reactions and start forwarding it to other groups. Next text and it turns out to be a sad news. There might be people we would want to share this information with too. If it is the case of a demise, there will be a string of RIPs received, mostly with an emoticon. Next window and you’re welcomed with your friend’s vacation pictures or shopping list or OTT watch recommendations. Your neurons would pull you to participate in that conversation as well. So, within a span of, perhaps thirty minutes, one sifts through a myriad of information with no actual time spent to really feel any of it. Has this ever happened to you?” he asked. ‘All the time,’ was the answer in my head.
Think about it. The scroll habit isn’t only to do with our device, but also the fact that this habit is slowly permeating into the way we operate in life. I find it difficult to hold a thought without distraction or several other thoughts gushing past, it is tough to not hop from one window to the other on the laptop; let’s admit that we all reach out for Whatsapp every few seconds and do we even stay on one post for more than 2 seconds. I go to Whatsapp and draw into a blank wondering what had I opened it for? The multi-tasking, perpetually distracted mind makes me suspect of amnesia at times especially when I see a familiar face walk by or even smile at me while I struggle to place the person. I have been embarrassed of not remembering names and every day travel directions.
During our conversation, my friend posed a few questions. If scroll culture is what we are imbibing, where we do not permit our minds to absorb any information, wouldn’t it lead to us being unable to absorb a feeling as well? And if we do not invest our energies in deep feelings, how can we expect deep thoughts to ignite our minds, engage in deep conversations or even have deep relationships? We want emails and pings to be instantly answered at work, instant delivery of grocery, instant weight loss, and all of this without deeply feeling any instant. Do we invest time to stop and absorb?
While I was there to catch-up with my friend for ‘quick bite,’ he did leave me with some thoughts to chew over. And I must confess that I am not any different from everyone else who is trapped in the ‘IG – instant gratification’ concept that has been sold to us. If I say I don’t like small talk, if I vie for idyllic living, if I wish to be creative at work and develop meaningful relationships, I have got to dedicate some time to build my mind to absorb.
A few days of mulling over that conversation, here I am with a new hobby – staring into nothingness. It is byte-sized 15-minute dedicated routine I have decided to follow. Shall tell you how it goes!
